Aine Fox

This 24 year-old Belfast man claims he has 50 skills any employer would be lucky to have but he just can’t seem to get a job.

So Aaron Butler has decided to send a job application with a difference out to the whole wide world.

Aaron Butler in his CV video

The Queen’s and University of Ulster graduate has posted two minutes of footage showing him explaining his plight as an unemployed young person, and then rapping about his skills in the workplace.

After six months on the dole and watching other friends progress in their careers, the Marketing and Creative Multimedia graduate said he wanted to make a statement about his enthusiasm for gaining employment.

“I will literally do anything I can,” he told the News Letter. “I am a creative person and I am really driven and I want to show how motivated I am.”

Aaron, who said he lives at home with his parents to cut living costs, said he is about to be put on a Steps to Work scheme but is unenthused at the prospect.

“For someone like me it will not be beneficial,” he said. “People have this image of unemployed people being lazy and all the rest but I have been using all the time I have to apply for jobs in the industry I am passionate about and I am always producing and being creative.

“If I was put in a call centre or a supermarket it would be the worst thing that could happen - that kind of life will not motivate me at all.”

Apart from a week-long stint helping on set with a Ben Kingsley movie last summer, Aaron said he had been unable to gain further employment.

With a dream job in mind at American network NBC as a writer on Saturday Night Live, Aaron recognises he is aiming high.

“If I could get a job in America I would be there now,” he said. “It’s not that I don’t love Northern Ireland, I do, but I would love to go there and be successful and be able to bring work back here.

“At the minute I am willing to work where ever I can.”

After criticism for adding a swastika to the video at the point where he raps about leadership Aaron said it was “clearly a joke” and he was “obviously making a point that that’s not what leadership should be”.

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